WRC, pretty soon I'll have it on CDBaby and then more downloadable stuff should be available. However, Tom has official CDs coming to him by March 6th, and those have covers and inserts with lyrics and original artwork...

Maybe I shouldn't have gave out these coverless versions since I could have waited and gave you all the deluxe versions, but when the music was done I didn't feel like I could wait to send it out.

Iíve listened to the CD attentively four times and took a few notes along the way. Itís rare for me to delve into new music that deeply. Bobís past work and the excitement he conveyed when recording and mixing were underway gave me sense of musical art in the works - and motivated me to pay closer attention.

This CD is an impressive achievement because it hangs together from song to song stylistically and arrangement wise. It feels like a concept album which is a good thing.

The arrangements and instrumentation are ambitious with a leaning towards a spacey airy vibe that takes me back to the early 70ís. Soundstage placement seems like it was given a lot of thought. For some songs, the arrangements are at the centre of my attention at the expense of engaging melody and chord patterns. But the arrangements are still a pleasure to immerse in.

In general the song melodies and chords lean more to the minor seventh jazzy feel with a lot of hypnotic repeats and significant intros. The group America is one example of this feel.

For me, the home run of the CD is the smart, elegant and concise lyrics which create mystery, ambiguity and sensuality better than most songs Iíve heard through the years Ė and all without trying too hard. Iíd love to be able to write lyrics like this.

Singing is most effective when Bob uses his patented dry talking style which conjures up Lou Reed and Dylan. Harmonies are sometimes al little too atonal for me with some pitchiness and dropped notes throughout. But I think it was part of the vibe they were going for. The harmonies sometimes make me think of CSN and Buffalo Springfield.

This is a CD which I would tend to occasionally listen to from start to finish. Only three songs are engaging enough on the melody/chord/singing level to make me really perk up. These would be the tracks I would have in shuffle play mode.

Negotiations has a cool north African vibe with some tasty flute work.

Does She is a strong favourite which makes me want to join the singing. And It has an infectious African/Graceland guitar riff. Way cool song!

My overall favourite is Canít Fight the Blue. Itís a lovely major chord acoustic number with cool harmonies and great sounding acoustic guitar well played Ė conjuring up Nick Drake. This is a triumph of ďless is moreĒ.

I think the drum you are speaking of is two drums where they answer each other across the speakers. One is a talking drum, and the other is I forget what you call it. Like an ordoo or something like that. It's like a ceramic thing that you hit the hole on top to make that wet low sound. Matt has a lot of stuff.

Thanks, Pop. I think I am proud to claim this album. Or maybe what I feel is it did get at things I wanted to get at. I mean, when I play it for my own self it fills needs I have, and maybe that's the main thing.

well as much as I hate going to IAC, I went over to listen to 4 of your songs tonight.

Dreamtown - I heard the Gimme Shelter in the intro. I thought the chorus was pretty good but the vocals in the verses sounded rough and not that pleasant to my ears. Nice tasteful ending though.

Some Time Later - What is this song about? Just a stream of consciousness? The backing touches of guitar somewhat distracted from the melody, that is what there was, for me. I felt mixed about the psychedelic interludes. Sometimes it sounded too random and other times it hit sweet spots. Nice fadeout though.

Like Your Face - Every song so far has had birds in it. This reminds me of CSN (a bit derivative) though unlike CSN, your vocal ensembles are so lacking in preciseness at times that I start to think you're doing it deliberately and hiding behind them rather than writing good parts. The driving acoustic part in the middle of this was good. I guess I like this one the best so far, has the most potential, more that interests me. Lyrics really don't make much sense. Build a place like your face? Do you mean a place in a song, then it might make sense. but a location isn't really in the same ballyard as a face. haha

Broken Wing - I liked the keys backing on this, was a nice change of pace. Again the vocals fell into that overly vague zone on the harmonies, but about halfway thru the song it got better though I didn't like the panning of them. I also didn't like the heavy clopping towards the end whatever that was. Wow I just realized this song is about birds too, strange I set out to listen to the first 3 songs and the last and they were all bird songs. Maybe you should've called your record Birdtown. Anyway this one sort of went way off track at the end. I admire your braveness, because the way you talked about this record it seemed that you thought it out a lot yet a lot of the things seem like one night "winging" no pun intended.

I don't know, Bob. Your voice is good and there's a nice flow rhythmically about your music as there always has been. The songs that I listened to mostly don't really seem to be about anything, and you take a lot of shortcuts as far as writing goes, it's kind of like you say to your partner 'sing here' or he says 'I'll sing behind you here' and you often don't seem to care if you even hear a part in your head, it suffices for you to just occupy that phrase with another voice. Sometimes you hit on a good one but other times it seems like a first demo or something, I'm over here thinking What's that supposed to be?

Your music sounds like you and like nobody else, that's a positive, but if I were you I wouldn't take too seriously all the kudos I've read here that you've gotten from Planeteers. I think your earnest persona or maybe the way you sometimes go way overboard raving for others might prevent some here from being completely honest with you. That said at least you keep finding time to work on music and I definitely wish I could find it in me to do more of that myself.

We appreciate the listen. I don't believe there are any other birds on the album, though there is a rabbit, lion, snake and monkey.

Other then the song "Spacetime," the notes and voices and words and rhythms all are how we like them, but I always feel I let Spacetime through too soon.

Hope you hear the rest of it. There's so much color still to come. The one that trips me out mostly these days is "Breaking the Symmetry."

I trust people here speak their minds, and I do speak mine, but I already knew how I felt about the album before I let it go. Even while making it I was pretty sure we wouldn't reach everybody with this music, but I guess that's the one advantage of being an artist with a day job. You can move into the places you need to go. Dreamtown is a place I need to go.

Tom sent me those harmonies on "Like Your Face" with a note saying he found what he liked and he thinks it's a classic. I listen and think it's too challenging. The timing is cool, but the notes have this dissonance I think will be too much for people, so I write him and ask him to use the same timing, but put notes together that wouldn't violate any of the rules for harmony Bach would have held dear.

He surprisingly doesn't argue even though he loves his first harmonies. He gives me two new versions with more conventional harmonies and they both work. But meanwhile as he spends some days working on it, I just keep needing to hear his first harmonies. Something about them, I gotta keep listening. When I get the new harmonies, even though they work nicely, and they are less dissonant, somehow my brain now has a fierce drive toward his first harmonies and nothing else is gonna do. At this point, to me they sound 'classic' just as they did to him, and we use those.

But probably I was right in some sense with my first impression that they are too much too handle. But he's now changed my brain to where for a few weeks I had to hear that stuff a few times a day because the weird way they work was scratching some itch for me that no other music was doing.

That sort of trip each other out and stretch our minds around it until we're addicted...that sort of thing is what the album is built on. So coming out of it we were never too sure what effect the music was going to have on others, but it really grabbed something we had been talking about for many years. What else can you do?

It's an album aimed at our subconscious. The words the notes the timings...takes us to Dreamtown, but others have other dreams.

if I were you I wouldn't take too seriously all the kudos I've read here that you've gotten from Planeteers.

What would taking that seriously be like? He should take it like feedback from other musicians. Would my giving him a note by note breakdown of what I liked and didn't be helpful to him? Helpful to me? Your first part of your statement "sounds like you"...is the goal. Getting some guy like me...or you...to love it and add it to our desert island albums collection is a side effect of that journey/work landing with our sensibilities and place in life. You can't control what lands. You go on your artistic journey...you come back with a collection of songs. Or course you HOPE it lands-we're human...but, any suggestion I (as example) make is making it less HIM...and more ME...collaborative music making is beautiful thing-but posting work for people to hear is not collaboration.

well you know it's part of that long term debate. Often at forums like this everybody gives nicey nice reviews unless they have some bone to pick with the person submitting and then they feel free to get more real.

I don't really care what you do with your own critiques. I was just surprised that I saw no one mention various elements I mentioned and told Bob my own visionary opinion on the thang.

Hi, Tom here. I dig that Popman even mentioned us in the desert island collection. This is definitely that for me. I've been listening to this album almost exclusively for the last few weeks and I still want more. What more could you want from an album than to really enjoy it yourself?

To me, one of the most satisfying things is that people are listening to it again. Sometimes you hear a new recording and you say, "Yeah, I get it," but then it doesn't end up in your shuffle. I hope that every time you listen, you hear something new.

A little note on "Can't Fight the Blue" - The guitar and kalimba were recorded by Bob and Matt at the beach - I think you can hear the fire crackle at one point. He sent it to me just like that and I wrote the melody, harmony and lyrics. Most of the other stuff was much more intricate collaboaration. This one was just one of those perfect little moments where you write something that feels like it always existed.

Hi, Tom here. I dig that Popman even mentioned us in the desert island collection. This is definitely that for me. I've been listening to this album almost exclusively for the last few weeks and I still want more. What more could you want from an album than to really enjoy it yourself?

To me, one of the most satisfying things is that people are listening to it again. Sometimes you hear a new recording and you say, "Yeah, I get it," but then it doesn't end up in your shuffle. I hope that every time you listen, you hear something new.

A little note on "Can't Fight the Blue" - The guitar and kalimba were recorded by Bob and Matt at the beach - I think you can hear the fire crackle at one point. He sent it to me just like that and I wrote the melody, harmony and lyrics. Most of the other stuff was much more intricate collaboaration. This one was just one of those perfect little moments where you write something that feels like it always existed.

Well, don't say anything nice about it, Steve, because I have actually complimented you on your singing before a few months ago, and so clearly from now on everything you say about my music is not valid.

And also, all those who I have never heard your music before and don't actually know you much, clearly what you say is not valid either because it just isn't.

Well, don't say anything nice about it, Steve, because I have actually complimented you on your singing before a few months ago, and so clearly from now on everything you say about my music is not valid.

And also, all those who I have never heard your music before and don't actually know you much, clearly what you say is not valid either because it just isn't.

ah, getting a little defensive there cause I dared to knock some of the shine off your Sgt. Pepper ?

There is no such thing as a lie. You can never be disingenuous. On the surface there may be a lie, but underneath.. You can only be pure spirit shining out. We can be as ridiculous as we please. Still, we are pure spirit being ridiculous..

I'm not sure if this resonates with any of you. Fault me for my inability to explain.. But, to me? This is just the song of life playing out -in all it's glory. We are beautiful when our hearts are right.

I welcome your thoughts on the work, as always. I don't know why it is important to you to frame other people's thought as disingenuous.

It ain't that important to me to do that, was just saying what was on my mind. Having read the buildup before I listened caused me a separate reaction and I felt I should comment on that. Maybe I shouldn't have.

One day I was walking through the woods; my head was filled with the weight of the world. And I was Jesus -the savior of the world. I was paralyzed and I wore a crown of thorns around my head. The thorns were not thorns. But rather they were thoughts dancing 'round and 'round my head as I labored to endure this world.

And this is the way I stood in the middle of this forest.

And this was the way I stood in the middle of heaven..

I was a stone statue -frozen in place -unable to move -paralyzed by things of my own reckoning..

In this woodland, a squirrel dared approach me side wise very carefully..He took me in fully. And with an all-knowing side glance and a flash of bright eyes, he burst out in laughter..

He began to dance. In this way he said to me the most wondrous things ever spoken..

in this way my teacher, the squirrel, began to speak.

'You." "You cannot even see me." "Look!" "You cannot even see me." "Try as you will, you are blind as a bat."

"Yet still.."

You belong.

Even as you are -you belong.

Look at me with your full attention -look at me with your full heart open.. Be amazed!

Now, you belong better to the universe.Now.. you see more clearly.Now, your heart is awake.Now, your teacher is awake.Now, you are ready to learn..